Breastfeeding Practice Before Bottle-Feeding An Initiative to Increase the Rate of Breastfeeding for Preterm Infants at the Time of Neonatal Intensive Care Unit Discharge

Preterm infants can be supported in learning to breastfeed successfully before leaving the NICU without increasing the time to full oral feeds or the length of NICU stay. If preterm infants get 3 days of focused direct breastfeeding practice before introducing a bottle, they are significantly more likely to be breastfeeding at the time of NICU discharge than if bottles were introduced first. Although not all mothers can be present for a period of focused breastfeeding practice, we can support the subset of mothers who can be present at feeding times and are highly motivated to do so by their desire to breastfeed. This QI initiative demonstrated that by supporting these mothers and their preterm babies, we could achieve significantly increased breastfeeding and breast milk feeding rates at the time of NICU discharge.